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Promotion Policy: it’s Definition, Advantages and Disadvantages

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Promotion Policy: Definition, Advantages and Disadvantages!

The usual policy is to take merit into consideration. Sometimes length of service, education, training courses completed, previous work history, etc., are factors which are given weight while deciding on a promotion.

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Although promotions are made on the basis of ability, hard work, cooperation, merit, honesty, many formal influences are powerful determinants of a promotional policy.

For higher posts, persons are picked by the top executives:

(i) Who think and feel just as he does;

(ii) Who value loyalty to him and to the organization; and

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(iii) Who have social, political, economic and religious interests similar to his own? Top executives lend to choose those who are carbon copies of themselves.

Seniority versus Merit:

“Seniority” refers to length of service in the company or in its various plants, or in its departments, or in a particular position. Under straight plant wise seniority in all jobs, promotions go to the oldest employees, provided that he is fit for the job. Occupational seniority may be within a department, within a division or in the entire plant.

Seniority offers certain rights and benefits. These are:

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(a) Some rights are based on competitive seniority among employees. Rights to promotion, transfer, lay-off and recall are such examples.

(b) Other benefits have nothing to do with one man relative to another, e.g., a man may be entitled to have 15 days’ casual leave in a year, a pension after 50 years and a certain amount of sick leave after 6 months’ service.

There is a great controversy on the question of whether promotions should be given on the basis of seniority or ability. Trade unions are of the view the promotions should be given on the basis of seniority, while managements favour promotions on the basis of merit and ability.

If a promotion is given to a qualified man in recognition of his performance or with a view to creating an incentive for him, then it should be based on his ability. If, on the other hand, promotion is given to recognise and reward senior employees, then it should be on the basis of seniority.

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The most widely used basis for promotion combines both ability and seniority. The best policy would be ensure that whenever there are two employees of equal seniority, ability or merit should be the deciding factor in a promotion. Where, however, there are two employees of almost equal competence, seniority should be the decisive factor. Such a policy would satisfy the management which prefers ability, and trade unions which prefer seniority.

Advantages of these criteria are as follows:

1. It is an objective means of distinguishing among personnel. Under this criterion it is not the management but the system which rank individuals.

2. The measurement with this criterion is both simple and exact.

3. The criterion is in consonance with our culture in which seniority is respected in all walks of life.

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4. The criterion gives a feeling of security and assurance to the individual who can calculate his promotion well in advance.

5. Seniority, being valued as an asset, prevents people from leaving an organization. It thus reduces labour turnover.

The Disadvantages of this criterion are as under:

1. Excessive emphasis on seniority leads to the promotion of incompetents. Oldest is not always the ablest. Accumulation of years of experience or length of service does not invariably produce ability. In any case, the demonstrated ability to perform a given job provides no assurance of the potential to perform at a higher level or in a different type of job, The “Peter principle” certainly is relevant in this context.

This principle enunciated by L.F. Peter in his light hearted book, characterizes the common practice of promoting people to their “level of incompetence”.

The confirmation of the principle is demonstrated by many examples of individuals who have been promoted from time to time because of their satisfactory performance in their past positions and who then are promoted to positions exceeding their level of ability—in other words, to positions matching their “level of incompetence.” The morale of this is that at some point on the promotion ladder those very qualities of an employee which have helped him in getting promotions in the past become his liabilities.

At this point naturally the employee’s further promotions stop and he stays there till the end of his career as an incompetent executive. Hence, in considering individuals for promotion one needs to assess future potential rather than his present performance.

The only justification for devoting space on a performance appraisal form to the trait of promotability is to indicate unused potential so that various persons might be appraised for more demanding positions in the company.

2. When seniority is the only deciding factor in promotion, initiative inevitably withers away. Human nature being what it is, few people will take the trouble of qualifying themselves for the next rung up the ladder if they can achieve the same goal merely by “putting in time.”

3. The seniority criterion adversely affects the morale of meritorious workers and drives the ambitious and able men, with little service, out of the organization.

It can now be easily understood that seniority by itself is an incomplete criterion. Much of the clamor for its recognition as the sole criterion is based on a fundamental distrust of management. But in the interests of efficiency, equity and a contented workforce the management should work out a compromise between seniority and merit.

Only when coupled with merit does seniority meet the two-fold aim of affording the employee due recognition for his years of service and of providing him with a built in incentive to qualify himself for advancement. Thus, there is always the problem of balancing one in relation to the other.

Every organization must decide on the relative weights it will give to the merit and seniority in making promotion decisions. For example, seniority may be completely controlling in such matters as length of vacations or choice of shifts but only partly controlling in such matters as transfers and promotions.